Troubled Night
by Lizardios
Summary: Answer to a challenge given to me. A oneshot on Master Chief and Arbiter's relationship 3 years after the Covenant War slight slash


Note: This fic was a challenge given to me. Normally I d ignore something like this… No I don't have a problem with Slash fics, though they aren't in the top ten of fics I like to read, but writing them… Sorry, normally I would say 'Hell no', just not my style.

Warning: Slight Slash

Disclaimer: I don't own Halo, do you seriously think I do!?!

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John awoke. It took him a full minute to realize why. His mate, lying next to him in the bed, was mumbling, in his native tongue. 

The Covenant War had ended 3 years ago, the tides having turned when the Grunts, Hunters and the Elites had joined with the humans. As everyone in the UNSC knew, the Elites were essentially alien counterparts to the SPARTANS, they had the shields, the same strength, speed… and a whole race of them, working with the humans. At first, xenophobia had been widespread, but after the new alien troops had a massive role in saving the Earth, again, people had learnt to adapt. But now that the war was over, mankind had found a new form of prejudice discrimination. After all, hadn't these aliens once tried to wipe them out? The UNSC had expected the worse, but amazingly, the aliens accepted it. Because they knew it was true? Probably.

John, SPARTAN-117 was one of the few who weren't prejudice towards his old enemies. He knew what it was like; he had heard a lot of crap about being a freak, mostly from the Helljumpers, who'd despised the SPARTAN project. But, he had somehow got involved with one of the few elites who had truly been a counterpart to him. The Elite in question had been disgraced because the first Halo had been destroyed, and was now only known as the Arbiter.

John reached over and started to rub the Arbiter's back, letting the translators do their job, despite knowing already what the dream was about, the day he was deemed a heretic. It had to have been hard on the Elite, to be born into a religion, which became your life and then become a heretic to them. The SPARTAN still felt a degree of guilt every time he saw the Mark of Shame that had been burnt into Arbiter's chest. At the time, John could have cared less that he'd condemned an Elite, but now…

The Arbiter awoke violently, shivering. Elites didn't cry, at least, not in the human sense, but John wouldn't have been surprised if he had suddenly developed the human form of crying. The Human put an extremely pale arm across the Arbiter's shoulders. The Elite tensed for a minute, before realizing who it was and relaxing into the loving hug. Despite the warm embrace, the heretic still shivered. The Elite had never told John about the torture he'd been put through, but whenever he thought about it, dreamt or otherwise, it made him fearful, afraid of what he knew was impossible now, but Tartarus had that affect on those he tortured, had thrived from it. It was one of the many things that had put him in such good favour with the Prophets. The Arbiter had been unlucky enough to have Tartarus given the council's blessing to do as he pleased with the Heretic, so long as he was alive afterwards. The Elite had wished for death at the time. The public humiliation had only been the tip of the iceberg, after that, when he'd been in the chamber, alone with the albino Brute, away from prying eyes… He had never felt so violated. Despite the Master Chief's arguments that it was better to let it out rather than keep it in, where it would destroy you, Arbiter refused venomously. Feeling it was better for him to tell in his own time, John left the subject, except for a habit of asking about it every morning after he had the dream.

The disgraced Elite started to stop shaking, thinking instead about the few friends he had. The Grunts, they were all friendly enough, but he didn't consider many of them friends, only a few. The problem with the grunts was that when they looked at him, they didn't see him, as he was, they only saw the saviour of their race. He hadn't seen Zann 'Zalonee, the Spec Ops Commander he had befriended during the Delta Halo incident, for a year now, but they still kept in touch. Sergeant Johnson, the first Human he had become friends with had also survived the war, and visited regularly, he too had got involved with an Elite, like John. Miranda Keyes had sacrificed her life, in one of the acts that had finally ended the war, joining her father. Then there was the Master Chief, who had only managed to worm his way into his heart two years ago, before then, the Arbiter had still been under the impression he was a demon. It wasn't until he had seen the man under the advanced armour that he had thought otherwise. He hadn't even known it was John when he'd seen the pale man, had just thought he was a regular human, if a little odd, since he'd never seen anyone looking like that before, he had learnt enough about the humans to know that being that pale was unnatural. He would never have guessed that it was the 'demon' he was looking at.

The Elite snapped out of his reverie at the sound of John's voice, asking him if he was ok, and did he want to talk about it? The Heretic shook his head, dismissing the second question. As much as he loved the SPARTAN, he didn't want to tell his former enemy about the horrors Tartarus had put him through. It was bad enough that he even knew what the dreams were about; unfortunately there was little he could do about the mumbling in his sleep, he hadn't even known he was doing it until the human had asked him about it one night. It was shocking, to say the least, as he hadn't intended on anybody knowing, ever.

The Arbiter sighed at the thoughts, clicking his mandibles in agitation. John, as if sensing his mood, pulled him closer, embracing the one he loved. At first, the Elite had been nervous about this kind of relationship, and was surprised to find that the human had been as well. The pair was more alike than he could have imagined at first glance. He nestled himself into the warm hug, resting his head on the SPARTAN's shoulder, closing his eyes, trying to return to a hopefully peaceful slumber. He knew John would ask about it again in the morning, with the now old excuse that it was better to let it all out, but Arbiter felt that this was better off left in. Although he would never admit it, one of the reasons he wouldn't tell was because he was afraid, scared that the human would leave him after hearing what had happened to him. He didn't know where the fear came from, but it was there, always at the edge of his mind, never leaving, no matter how much he willed it to. As he started to fall asleep once again, he vaguely noted that John was softly stroking his cheek, bringing a sense of comfort about returning to his sleep.

John watched as Arbiter started to sleep, before leaning over and softly kissing the Sangheili's cheek, whispering a good night. The Elite's mandibles twitched in a way that John had learnt to translate into a smile, before he too fell into a dreamless slumber.

-End

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And how was it. I hope it matched up to your expectations Mr Sorry-I-Forgot-Your-Name. As a note to anyone out there: I will accept most challenges unless they fall into 2 categories. 

1) It isn't in a category that I'm familiar with.

2) The challenge is something over used, (I accepted this challenge because I hadn't yet seen any Arbiter/Master Chief fics (sorry to anyone that **has** done this before)).

As a rule though, I'm only doing challenges in one shot. So blah :-p (god I'm immature.)


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